Improvements seen in foster care system Fewer kids in limbo in Milwaukee County

Improvements seen in foster care system Fewer kids in limbo in
Milwaukee County
By TOM HELD Posted: Feb. 4, 2004
Fewer abused and neglected children are lingering month after month
in the Milwaukee County foster care system, a sign of progress found
in an in-depth review of the child welfare operations released
Wednesday.
The overall number of children waiting to be adopted or reunited with
their families has declined from more than 6,000 in early 2000 to
fewer than 4,000 midway through 2003.
And more important to the children taken from their homes because of
abuse or neglect, the state-run Bureau of Milwaukee Child Welfare has
significantly reduced the length of time they spend in the frustrating
wait for a permanent home, either with family or with adoptive
parents.
"I'm astounded by the turnaround," said Mark Courtney, a co-author of
the evaluation issued by the Chapin Hall Center for Children at the
University of Chicago.
The independent review of progress in the child welfare program is
required as part of the state takeover of the Milwaukee County system
in 1998. At the time, the county-run child welfare system was
struggling with unwieldy social worker caseloads, unacceptably long
delays in moving children through the system and other failures.
Five years before the state takeover, Children's Rights Inc. filed a
federal lawsuit alleging that the deficiencies in the system violated
the rights of the children stuck in foster care.
At that time, roughly 60% of children placed in the child welfare
system remained in some form of foster care more than six months after
their initial placement, according to statistics in the Chapin Hall
evaluation. And it took child welfare workers more than four years to
move 75% of the children in the system into a permanent placement.
The evaluation from Chapin Hall found that 60% of the children in the
system in 2002 remained in foster care for roughly 18 weeks, showing
that they were moving through the system much faster than their
predecessors did 10 years earlier. And workers moved 75% of those
entering the system into a permanent placement in less than 18 months.
Much of the decline in the overall caseload was attributed to a sharp
decrease in the number of children entering the foster care system,
from roughly 2,500 in the late 1990s to about 700 per year.
Eric Thompson, an attorney with Children's Rights Inc., said the
numbers showed improvement, but "a lot of work still needs to be
done."
Thompson said he is waiting for more recent data, with figures through
the end of 2003, that would be included in a monitoring report
required in the settlement of the federal lawsuit.
'Good news' for children Denise Revels Robinson, director of the
Bureau of Milwaukee Child Welfare, said the findings in the Chapin
Hall study were "good news."
"On the other side of that, we accept responsibility to get better,"
she said.
Revels Robinson and roughly 60 other people representing the wide
array of public and private agencies focused on improving the lives of
children examined the Chapin Hall findings in a daylong meeting at the
Wingspread Conference Center in Racine. Their discussion centered
primarily on the challenges identified in the report.
"We certainly have not declared victory at this point," said Frank
Gaunt, who manages child welfare services for La Causa Inc., a
non-profit agency that provides services under contract with the
state.
The Chapin Hall study found that the agencies attempting to assist
families in the child welfare system are hampered by rapid turnover
and inexperience among social workers. The case managers assigned to
the 494 families studied in the review had a median of 1.6 years of
experience in social work and eight months in child welfare services.
"Having and keeping good staff is the essence of success in this
work," said Kitty Kocol, administrator of the state Division of
Children and Family Services. "We have to elevate and recognize the
value of the work they're doing."
Even experienced social workers, however, will continue to face severe
challenges beyond their control in the form of homelessness as well as
the unmet health care needs and lack of education that affect the
families they are trying to help.
About 70% of families in the study were below the federal poverty
line; half the caregivers reported that they lacked money for food and
basic needs; and only one quarter had full-time jobs
http://www.jsonline.com/news/metro/feb04/205148.asp
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